No Fooling - Last Minute Trip To Doctor Saved My Life

Flash back to April 1, 1993... Four days of fever, chills and the fight to take a breath finally drove me to make an appointment with a doctor. Being in my early 20s, I didn't have a PCP and picked one out of the phone book. As I got out of my car at the office, I stopped four times for several minutes between my car and the doctor's office to try to grab whatever oxygen I could out of the air. Just making it in the door, the receptionist looked white as a sheet at me and brought me right in. The doctor on staff immediately asked me to call someone, or they would call an ambulance for me. This was not good.

After suffering a huge bout with the flu over the New Years holiday a few months back, I knowingly or unknowingly began to rapidly loose weight (yes, I was running at the time, but not that many miles). This was paired with an insatiable thirst. Having competed in triathlons for years, I had a high threshold for pain and my bull-headedness worked along to make myself believe that I would get over whatever I had.

My office was right around the corner and I called a colleague to drive me to the local hospital. By this time everything was a blur and I could hardly breathe at all. In the ER, a quick blood check pointed out the obvious... a blood glucose 1200, paired with my symptoms... DKA, or Diabetic ketoacidosis. I was immediately admitted and spent the next four days recuperating and learning about my new life. I was later told by my doctor that I would have slipped into unconsciousness within a few hours had I not gone to the hospital.

Of all of the hospitals in metro Atlanta, fate stepped in that day and I was fortunate to live near one with one of the strongest diabetes treatment centers in the country. My diagnosing doctor also happened to be very highly recognized in the world of diabetes care (he is one of those doctors whose name can be found in the small type at the bottom of the page of groundbreaking studies as well as quoted within materials provided by the major pharmas and pump manufacturers).

Life didn't end for me that peculiar April holiday... it just changed course.

Shawn-ATL's Blog

I was fortunate to have an insurance provider (United) that is pretty liberal toward CGMS. I have been indifferent toward getting started with it, but after my package arrived, my enthusiasm increased. I've seen a lot of posts about fears of the needle associated with the Medtronic CGMS Sof-Sensor, but it honestly hurt no more or no less than my pump needle, or the thousands of BD syringes that I have stuck myself with over the years. At this point, I think I could shoot myself up with one of… Continue

That's what I feel like tonight. The past three days have been a struggle, with averages in the 300s and after posting last night my BS peaking at 451 last night, I finally was able to push my number down to a "good" 180 by 3 AM this morning. Not trusting, I did a full correction and went back to bed. At 7:30 AM, I still felt… Continue

This weekend has been one of the most challenging since moving to the pump. Over the past week or so, I have been waking with BGs in the 200s, which until this week, has not happened. I met with my CDE late in the week and we had a plan in place to determine what the heck was going screwy with my AM numbers. However, since Saturday morning, I've been "chasing the high."

I awoke on Saturday morning and generally "felt" that I would again have a… Continue

Yesterday, April 1st, marked my 15th anniversary of being diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes mellitus. As I think back, it seems like yesterday in many ways. I remember the doctor telling me about my ridiculously high blood sugar in the ER. I remember the sincerity in his voice when he told me that I was lucky to be alive and that DKA would have taken my life within a few hours had not sought help. I remember the tech's coming in my… Continue

Has it been a month already? My 722 has quickly become a part of me. I hardly notice that it is there at all and I can't believe that I was pushing shots 4-6 times a day. What I don't understand is why I waited for so long to move to the pump. There was a huge mental block in making the move. Even with a mother who is a CDE and providing a steady stream of info about the pump for several years, I resisted. I guess it's like being a preachers kid... never wanting to listen to what you know is… Continue

Has it been a week already? Are my BD syringes now feeling neglected now that I am pumping rather than pushing insulin? I am surprised that my move to the pump has gone so smoothly (knock on wood) and my numbers have had dramatically changed. A chart of my BGs looks much more clustered, rather than a financials chart for a mortgage conglomerate. I am not getting as many high-highs. I have, however, had a few unexplained low-lows in the late afternoon and 2 hours after dinner in the evening. I… Continue

Knock on wood, but I have had a great first 24 hours with my pump. After starting the pump with a high, due to my cold turkey stop with Lantus the previous day and getting by on Humalog the last night, my afternoon following lunch seemed to trend down. By late afternoon I had a few lows that needed some carbs with it. Finally after dinner things stopped the downward trend. Over night I started a little high, but held in the 80s through the night and into the morning. By breakfast I was at 97… Continue

I started pumping at 8:15 this morning. I took my last Lantus shot the night before last and used small Humalog shots to get me through the night. I am officially off MDI's.

My pump start went smoothly and much faster than anticipated. My CDE said my start was the fastest she had done, due to my prep work and learning everything I could prior to my two meetings with her. After a quick quiz of "how would I do this and that," she supervised my prep, priming, connection and start of my… Continue

After receiving my pump last week I was concerned that it may take some time before I could start using it. Just getting my appointment at my diabetes treatment center has been tricky and I feared that it may be much longer before I could get rolling. My doctor wanted the center to assess my "readiness" and they would go from there.

Since deciding to move forward with the pump in December of 2007… Continue

It's here. My pump. The application and approval process went like greased lightening. Since then I have been reading anything and everything about pump life waiting for February 6th to come... the day it would be delivered. But wait a minute, yesterday - February 5th, after running my kids to swim lessons, I returned home to find a "we missed you" note from UPS. It had gotten here early, almost mocking me. UPS would hold it another day and return on the 6th. :>(

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Hey Shawn, I was reading your story about how you were diagnosed and My story is kind of similar. I was diagnosed back in 1991 and I was off at college and I was a college basketball player and was working out and wasn't sick or anything. For like 3 or 4 days straight I was always thirsty and kept running to the bathroom. My buddy and I decided to go home for the weekend because we were 3 hours away and as soon as I walked through the door my mom knew something was wrong and took me to the hospital. I have an aunt that was a big wig at that hospital and she looked at me and said "DIABETES" and I couldn't believe it. They tested my BS and it was 1000 and they told me that I could have went into a diabetic coma if I would have not come in when I did. I spent 5 days in the hospital getting educated on how to give myself the shot and testing my BS and I was turned loose. The sad thing was that I never considered getting on the pump until about a month ago and couldn't face being hooked up to something all the time. Now I'm waiting on my pump to come in the mail. I was giving myself 3 to 4 shots a day and I just was tired of the needle. So I thank you for your story and just happy (not in a bad way) that someone else has a story like mine.
Thank you,
Dooie

Hi Shawn, just wanted to say congrats on 15 yrs and also on pumping. I have had T1 now for 15 years as well, and resisted the pump at first too. Single best thing I have done for my diabetes care and sounds like you are finding it to be the same. Congrats on your comeback :).

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